Cyrus Solaris
The cadence of the newly drizzling rain quickened as it slapped against the pavement.
I yelled out to the kid, but my words had no effect.
Adam's sister said overexhaustion wasn't out of the norm here at Xhatal Academy, but this just felt strange.
I trotted over to him, my fancy dress shoes splashing through the puddles, filling the inner membrane with water, soaking my feet, every step squeaking obnoxiously.
When I got to the student, he fared no better than me. His clothes drenched to the point they clung to his skin. The kid was sleepwalking.
I patted his shoulders, trying to wake him. But that didn't work either.
I looked at his face. His eyes were nearly rolled back, and his once tan skin was now devoid of color.
This was concerning.
I quickly checked his core; it was dangerously low on cosmic energy. Reminding me of the kid I found in the tree during the totem games.
I needed to get him out of here.
As I began to lift the kid and throw him over my shoulders once again.
The clouds darkened, turning the sky into dusk. A bright streak of light cracked in the upper atmosphere. Being so high up in the sky, it's hard not to tremble whenever the elements make their presence known.
But there was something else out here. Something that caused a large distortion in space.
It was moving fast.
A deep rumble boomed in the air. I thought it was the aftershock of thunder, but this felt more alive, like a low, guttural growl.
My eyes darted– left, right, up, down– but I saw nothing.
My heart raced as I sprinted along the pavement, making my way towards the medbay.
Running with the kid on my shoulders in the rain was difficult; his slick body kept slipping from my grip, and it didn't help that the distortion was getting closer and closer with every step.
I had to make a choice.
Keep running or face whatever is coming for us.
A dark shadow loomed over me, canceling the effect of the lamps that lined the walkway, making my decision for me. The shadow was large, spanning around ten feet in diameter. I looked up, and I couldn't see much; all I heard was the swift motion of the wind.
The ripples in space told me something was close. Close enough to touch it if I just reached out.
But I still couldn't see it.
Up– no. Left–no, right– damn it.
My hands trembled as I lowered the student to the ground.
Then the deep, guttural growl returned, echoing in both my eardrums as if the creature were right beside me. I went to grab my staghorn blade from my dimensional storage, but it wouldn't open.
I tried again, and it failed. I tried again, and again, again, failing every time. The growl only grew louder.
I snatched the dimensional storage from my hip, shook it, and even threw it on the ground.
Still nothing.
Then in the dim light of the night. I saw two glowing eyes. My heart nearly jumped out of my chest.
I quickly turned to the student. I screamed for him to get up and run, but I could have been yelling at a manikin for pathenon's sake.
I was left with nothing else to do.
I took in a single breath and focused on the distortions. But now, I sensed nothing.
Many thoughts ran through my head: Am I tired? Maybe I am hallucinating? Is this a dream? Because even though I couldn't sense a distortion anymore, a large flickering figure appeared across from me.
I blinked once, and a colossal force caused me to gasp for air.
My eyes bulged, nearly popping from the force of the hit, as my body skipped across the pavement. I braced for a follow-up.
But it never came.
I searched everywhere until I saw him.
The sleepwalking student hung in the air.
His head tilted, neck exposed as he was slowly drawn toward a pair of floating eyes eight feet above the ground.
A slight indentation formed on the kid's neck. The sight reminded me of how a wolf would kill its prey. But no blood trickled from the spot. Instead, the kid lost more of his cosmic energy.
Is that an astral behemoth? Did it come from a rift nearby?
Whatever it was, I had to save the kid. I dashed forward, trying to focus on the small trickle of cosmic energy flowing from the kid into the creature, hoping to gain insight into its position.
The kid's position darted in the air.
Left, right, up.
Gotcha.
I enveloped one of my fists with cosmic energy and used the other to grab the kid from the clutches of this beast. I succeeded in getting the kid, but the strike I threw seemed to pass right through the flickering figure.
Not again.
The glowing eyes narrowed, and an intense burst of cosmic energy was released as the creature growled into the sky out of what I could only assume was anger.
Channeling cosmic energy into my legs, I began a mad dash, taking the kid with me.
I didn't get far.
Something large clasped my free shoulder, and out of instinct, I activated gravity well. But the pressure around my shoulder only increased, causing my body to lurch backward, tumbling against the hard, wet pavement once again.
After my third bounce off the pavement, I was lifted into the air by my left arm, watching my feet dangle.
My head was pushed to the side, leaving my neck exposed. I kicked and thrashed as much as I could.
Nothing worked.
A low and heavy breath infiltrated my ears, the same sound a beast would make when it bared its fangs.
I slammed my eyes shut, to the point where I could only see a black void, and imagined the thickest layer of cosmic energy possible to wrap around my exposed neck.
The pressure I felt against the layer of cosmic energy was like fighting back against a mountain to keep it from falling. Cracks were splintering by the second, and it wasn't long till my protective layer gave way.
Then I felt it, the deep puncture that bypassed my flesh.
Slowly, I felt my energy drain, my eyes blur, and my thoughts slow.